LAA Sywell Rally

The rally will be fully reported in the aviation magazines so I’m not going to replicate that, but here are three aircraft that caught my eye.

Mike Whitaker, the prolific light aircraft designer, standing in front of what he says is his last project, the MW9 Plank. You can see it flying (well, Mike described it as “hopping”) in this YouTube video.

The original Wallis autogyro, Little Nellie, from the James Bond film ‘You Only Live Twice’. As a 15 year-old I saw Ken Wallis flying this at a Filton airshow in the late 60’s (proper airshows where you had to duck as the aircraft went over the crowd). I made the Airfix kit and can still remember brushing on the yellow paint.

The extraordinary Conway Viper SSDR being designed and built by David Conway near Oxford. Power is supplied by four miniature jet engines under the rear fuselage. Here’s a video of an X-Plane simulation of the aircraft. If it can really fly like that, it will certainly be something to see (hope he’s done the stress calculations thoroughly…).

Richard Griffiths

Latest Listening Squawks and LARS Coverage Leaflet

Have you signed up for the GASCo Flight Safety Mag?

The Autumn issue has a provocative article on navigation that is certainly worth a read. Did you know there’s a squawk for if your GPS stops working? It’s 0030. Strictly speaking it’s for if you are lost – not necessarily the same thing. 🙂

You can get a paper version posted to you if you subscribe, or read it on their website: www.gasco.org.uk The content is hidden under the ‘hamburger menu’ (the three little horizontal stripes icon top right).

FASVIG is now A4A – Airspace For All

The Future Airspace Strategy VFR Implementation Group has just renamed itself to the snappier title: Airspace For All, shortened to A4A. They also have a new website, designed by Strut member, Steve Hutt. Check it out at: airspace4all.org .

Down on the farm 07

This month 09.18:-

Bristell NG5 G-NGAAprogress report

The Eagle has flown:- Alpha Alpha has made its first flight in Farry’s hands from Palmersfarm on 8.9.18 and it went well generally with adjustments required on the pitot /AoA pipes ie pipes needed swapping over ie Airspeed not working and the aileron trim wires needed swapping over. We also had to set up the new prop to suit the engine power by fining the blades by 2 degrees.

It flew perfectly straight out of the box but then it should as it is a new modern plane. The paperwork has now been submitted.

Klemm L25C G-ACXE

The aileron rods have been sent away for welding. We have acquired a second hand helical drive gear for the Pobjoy engine but we might use our original as it appears to be in better condition. The new exhaust valves have just arrived from G&S vales of Godalming. All our exhaust valves were worn on the stems which meant new ones were required and as no one had any new stock we decided to get 10 new ones made to standard dimensions, not cheap but I think reasonable priced at £38 per valve which gives us 3 spare valves for other people. Francis Donaldson has just built a Pobjoy engine for his plane and I attach a link to the video of the first engine runs. Francis also left an engine mount with me at Sywellwhich was loaned to him and to us temporarily so that we can modify our engine mount to suit the actual engine requirements. The welder has been primed and this will be our next job when Jim returns from his holidays, ie make a jig, cut the tubes out, fabricate the new configuration, tack with the TIG and hand it over to the welder for finish welding followed by a coat of 2 pack white paint. Francis also gave us a surplus set of tab washers for our engine that he had made for his engine.

Tony Berryman completed the test flying on the Tigerand the paperwork has been submitted.

At Deanland with Roy’s Jungman (Photo to follow).

On test

I have also set up a virtual radar station using the Pilotaware equipment called PWpalmers

Tony Palmer

Need to get to grips with EASA regulations?

A useful resource for finding your way through the various parts of European aviation regulations is Part-Aero.com Makes for interesting bed-time reading. 🙂

All-Party Parliamentary Group on General Aviation Airspace Inquiry

Tony received an email from Matthew Bolshaw, Public Liaison Officer to the All-Party Parliamentary Group on General Aviation announcing their inquiry into. UK airspace and its management. This looks like a very significant development. They have put out a general call for evidence, closeing on 31st October 2018. Organisations will be invited to submit, but individual submissions are also accepted.

Focussing primarily on lower airspace, the inquiry is likely to cover topics such as;

Current and potential future issues relating to the overall strategy, policy and principal mechanics guiding airspace design, management and the measurement of effective performance

The principal current and potential future influences on airspace strategy and policy as identified by different stakeholder groups

The underlying principles that should be used to guide all airspace-related matters (e.g. proportionality; need to maintain currency/relevance of designs; retire designs when no longer required; periodic independent reviews – e.g. by National Audit Office – of the efficiency and effectiveness of airspace strategy, policy and specific mechanisms; equitable consideration of all stakeholder groups; requirement for evidence-based inputs; reference to best practice; etc.)

Assessment of the efficiency and effectiveness of current airspace-related processes

Delegations of authority, including the allocation of accountabilities, responsibilities, roles and interests

The role of non-governmental organisations that are a part of the established airspace system (e.g. NATS)

The case for making change in priority geographical areas

Whether airspace change sponsors should make financial contributions in return for taking away airspace from other users – similar to so-called Section 106 provisions in national planning policy

For the full terms of reference and how to get involved, go the the APPGGA website.

Help wanted with Vans RV7 completion

I am looking for some help to complete the build of our Vans RV7. It’s nearly there (that must sound familiar) but just needs all the little jobs finishing which seem to be taking some time. The aircraft is located in Brighton and I’m looking for someone that could help with the final push! Please get in touch with James Chapman: james AT temcouk.com (replace the ‘AT’ with ‘@’ for the email address).

Events

Regular meetings are in the Lounge Bar, The Swiss Cottage, Shoreham, 7:30pm.

October’s meeting, Wednesday 3rd, will be beer and chat.

November’s meeting, Wednesday 7th November, we will be having a talk by new strut member Tony Berryman. Tony has been testing Tony P’s Tiger and flies the Tigers for Duxford giving rides. He has experience in many other machines and has just retired from BA after many years of service with them. He is now looking forward to a retirement flying the planes he wants to. With 47 years and 28,000 hours of flying he will talk about interesting experiences over that time. Title of the talk is “From Comet to Tiger”.

Christmas Meal: Tony is organising this. Are we all happy with the Tolgate at Bramber? He will pencil in 7.30pm on 5.12.18, please let him know your thoughts.